After 60 years of community service, the Kogarah RSL Youth Club is facing Christmas homeless and broke.
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The club was originally housed in Colvin Hall, Kogarah for many years but had to move out in 2016 to make way for the redevelopment of the Kogarah RSL Club, now Club Kogarah.
After a temporary stay at the Shopfront Arts Co-op at Carlton, the youth club has been at the Bexley Masonic Hall for the past four years.
But the club is no longer able to afford the $3,600 a month rent and will have to find a new place for its activities.
"It's a fight to get to December," said Jenny Sammut,the club's co-ordinator. "We are very worried about our rent.
"I believe the NSW RSL requires that all RSL youth clubs have to become incorporated.
"The Kogarah RSL Sub-branch paid for us last month and this month but are not able to do it any longer.
"The sub-branch was told by the RSL head office that we would have to pay for ourselves."
The Kogarah RSL Sub-branch president, Dave John confimred that the sub-branch is not allowed to financiially support the youth club.
"We are bound by the limits of the RSL NSW constitution which says the Trustees and sub-branches must not 'make a donation or gift of $5,000 or more and may not make donations or gifts totalling $50,000 or more in any one calendar year.'
"Basically, we are going outside of our charitable purpose by continung to support the youth club," Mr John said.
"From a personal standpoint I'm not happy to see them disolve because they have given us a lot of support on Anzac Day over the years. It's a loss of a long history between our two organisations.
"We have financially assisted the Youth Club since they moved out of the Kogarah RSL Club but were informed by RSL NSW that this type of support was not constitutional," he said.
A Club Kogarah spokesperson said the club spent a considerable amount on the Shopfront Theatre to accommodate the youth club.
"We were working with them through the whole consultation period and they signed off on the design. They were happy to move there but after some time they moved on," the spokesperson said.
The RSL Youth Club has 67 children ranging in age for five-years to 18, Jenny said,
"When we were at Colvin Hall we had about 240 children but with the moves people don't know where we are or they don't want to come to Bexley," she said.
"We can't put our fees up. We are keeping the fees as low as we can so people from low socioeconomic families can come.
"The sub-branch has told us they will try and help us out till the end of the year. They paid our rent last month."
"We were paying $4,400 a month and the Masonic Hall reduced this to $3,600, but we can't survive on this."
Youth Club acting president Denise Mitford said it's a very bad situation, particularly for the members.
"We have got all these youth who need to be looked after and developed," Denise said.
"They have social interaction, instruction and fun. We also have activities for preschoolers. Plus we had a disability class for about seven children. They have been coming here since here since they were five and are now 18.
"We are mainly gymnastics but we have dancing and over the years we have had soccer and karate. We even had a band."
"Whatever skills and activities they want we are happy to provide."
"We are in desperate need of a home. There must be somewhere out there who can come to our aid."
